The police were determined to try and suppress even the smallest acts of support for the miners. My ex, myself and a group of friends regularly used to collect donations of food for the miners outside our local Sainsbury's, with the manager's permission. One day the police arrested my ex and friends and charged them under some obscure vagrancy act that had not been invoked since the 1700s. The case was taken to court but thrown out. What a waste of taxpayers money. We had the last laugh though as the case made the front page headlines of our local newspaper and made the police look like total chumps. And it did not stop us collecting.